roy shirLEy

1944–2008

Rocksteady Soul text David Katz photography David Katz Archive courtesy of Roy Shirley

Roy Shirley, who died of a heart attack at age sixty-three on July 17, was one of reggae music’s most individual performers. Often employing a quavering vibrato while garbed in unusual attire, Shirley has also been credited as the first rocksteady vocalist, his later hits of the 1970s leading to his coronation as “The High Priest of Reggae.”

Raised in Trench Town by his mother and stepfather in a community centered on a Revivalist church, Shirley received little formal education, due largely to physical mistreatment by some of his teachers. But as his mother is said to have the gift of prophecy, being able to see into the future, he received a spiritual foundation early in life. He also began singing in talent contests at a young age and was given early encouragement by Jimmy Cliff, who introduced him onstage at one of his first live performances. Although his first recordings, for producer Simeon “Little Wonder” Smith, were not released, a ballad called “Shirley,” his debut for the Beverley’s label, was a local hit in 1965.

Shirley then formed the Leaders with Ken Boothe, Joe White, and Chuck Josephs, but their recordings for Federal failed to impact. He subsequently joined the first incarnation of the Uniques with Slim Smith and Franklyn White, recording for Sir J.J. and Caltone.

Left alone when the Uniques temporarily disbanded, in 1967, Shirley crafted the unique and influential “Hold

Them,” named by many as the first rocksteady song. Cut at the first session funded by aspiring record producer Joe Gibbs, “Hold Them” ushered in the rocksteady era and brought Shirley to the attention of audiences outside Jamaica. Shirley then helped Bunny Lee enter the production arena, voicing the hit tunes “Get on the Ball” and “Music Field” at Lee’s first-ever recording session.

Frustrated by a lack of proper financial recompense, Shirley later formed the Public label to issue self-produced tracks such as “Prophecy Fulfilling,” “Flying Reggae,” “A Sugar,” and “On Board,” using Soul Syndicate, Peter Tosh, and the Barrett Brothers from the Wailers band for musical backing. Around the same time, Shirley also worked with Lee “Scratch” Perry, who arranged “I Am the Winner.” But it was Shirley’s 1969 version of Ben E. King’s “Heartbreaking Gypsy” that proved perennially popular.

Shirley first toured the United States in 1971, where he enjoyed a weeklong residency at the Apollo and performed at Madison Square Garden. He then toured U.K. the following year with U-Roy and Max Romeo, but this extended absence from Jamaica caused the Wailers to break the lock on his downtown Kingston record shop, taking over the premises by force. In the U.K., Shirley was featured in the mid-1970s television program Reggae in Britain, backed by Rico Rodriguez’s band, and appeared at the 1982 Reggae Sunsplash in Jamaica. Although based in the U.K. since the late 1970s, where he would go on to establish the British Universal Talent Development Association to support disaffected youth, Shirley continued to produce new material and to regularly perform in Jamaica, Canada, and select cities of the U.S., his final performance taking place at the Sierra Nevada World Music Festival in June. He will be remembered by all who knew him as a kind soul whose outlook on life matched the uniqueness of his musical creations. .

brookLyn hooks

The Menahan Street Band’s melodies find their way back home text David

Ma photography Matt Rogers

There’s a photo on display at Public School 20 in Clinton Hill, Brooklyn, showing a group of kids holding 45s, posing proudly on their school’s front steps with a local music ensemble. The musicians are the Menahan Street Band, and the kids, the 45s, the photo itself, all reflect a charming run of events.

“Menahan Street Band began ’cause we’re all friends who are in different bands and were touring separately all the time,” explains Tommy Brenneck, bandleader and producer of Menahan Street Band. “We wanted to record instrumental tracks that were just for us, you know, beats that we thought were dope. And over the course of about three years, we’d lay down tracks whenever we could to make these songs.”

Tommy’s all-star crew-members of El Michels Affair, Antibalas, the Dap-Kings, and the Budos Band-quietly pressed “Make the Road by Walking,” a 45 released in early 2006. A phone call would give the song unimaginable exposure. “The single we put out was on Dunham, which is a label I started specifically for this project,” expounds Tommy. “Exactly one year later, October ’07, we got a call from Roc-A-Fella Records asking for us, because the song had been sampled by Jay-Z and needed clearance.” The HitmenSean “Diddy” Combs’s longtime production team-had lifted the song and gave it to Combs, along with other beats, for consideration. Combs passed the beats to Jay, who apparently dug Menahan’s bold horn lines.

“We had a meeting with Jay-Z and were told it was for the American Gangster soundtrack,” Tommy continues, still seeming genuinely surprised. “They also told us it was gonna be his next single! We didn’t believe ’em. We thought they were saying that as a bargaining chip for leverage,” he laughs.

“Sure enough, three weeks later, it was on the radio all the time. Of all the music we’ve made through the years, this was Jay-Z’s single on his comeback album? We were psyched. It was unbelievable and kind of still is.”

Jay’s track, “Roc Boys (And the Winner Is…),” ran across airwaves worldwide and boomeranged back to Brooklyn where an elementary school principal noticed it. The principal, Shawn Keaton, was besotted by the horn-laden track and its raspy groove. Then came another random call. “Shawn’s kind of a young principal, and had heard Jay’s version, so he did some research,” Tommy explains. “He called us and invited us to come down to his school and watch his fourth- and fifth-grade [music] students perform ‘Make the Road by Walking.’ ”

Everyone involved in the song attended the recital. Having Jay-Z reinterpret the track was admittedly thrilling, but seeing kids play the original composition, exuberantly as they did, was humbling. “I remember being nervous for the horn player for when the horns dropped,” says Tommy. “I remember seeing little clarinet players covering this song we wrote in my bedroom. The trumpet player pounded his heart and gave a peace sign after the performance—the dude was so proud. I was on a high for, like, a week.”

The band revisited the school a few days later, talking and answering questions and jamming with the kids. “They treated us like we were rock stars,” Tommy says warmly. “The path of the song, making its way to Jay-Z, then the world, and back to these kids is amazing. We gave them some 45s that day, and we all went outside and took a group photo together. It was all so positive.” .

cLassic cuts

J.Rocc lets his fingers do the rocking text Ronnie Reese photography B+

After I interviewed DJ Rhettmatic for the Record Rundown in Wax Poetics Issue 22, he mentioned being clowned by fellow World Famous Beat Junkie J.Rocc for exceeding the normal ten-album “limit.” Although there really is no limit to the number of selections an artist can make, Rhett’s sixteen choices set a record that stands to this day. When I ask J.Rocc not to go the same route, he answers slyly, “I’m not going to do that. I might just give you one.”

But one won’t do for the Bridgeport, Connecticut, native. “I started DJing as soon as I heard ‘Rockit,’ ” J. recalls, echoing the words of nearly every leading second-generation turntablist, evident in a scene from Doug Pray’s 2001 Scratch documentary in which a litany of DJs cite Herbie Hancock’s seminal 1983 recording as inspiration for their careers. “As soon as I heard ‘Rockit,’ and as soon as I saw the back of Malcolm McLaren’s D’ya Like Scratchin’ album, I was trying to scratch. We were trying when ‘Planet Rock’ was out. We used to think it was like rubbing two cartridges together…we didn’t know what the hell scratching was.”

When it comes to records, J’s story begins with hip-hop. Pops would take the young Beat Junkie to warehouses and outlets like Music Plus to scour the bins for 45s and anything Parliament-Funkadelic related. “I went to those spots so much that I knew the days when the shipments would come in,” he explains, in true vinyl-nerd fashion. Once old enough to drive, and now living in Orange County, California, he hit the streets of Los Angeles to dig at stores like Rage Records, which was hyped on 1580 KDAY-AM. KDAY’s Mix Masters were a major influence, along with DJs at KACE and Uncle Jamm’s Army of DJs, which included Chris Taylor, Egyptian Lover, and Battlecat.

Today, J.Rocc is one of many in-house DJs at Stones Throw Records, where he is finishing a solo album and traveling the globe, playing as much James Brown as crowds will tolerate. It would have been interesting to hear him wax poetic on just one LP, or even expound to the lengths of Rhettmatic’s sixteen, but for a man who speaks best with his hands, these ten gems are more than enough to satisfy.

Five Fingers of Death Turntable Talk megamix

(Super Scratch) 1984

Turntable Talk is basically an old DJ record, like a four-track mix. As far as I know, it could be Dre, because Dre at the time was the only one running around doing “[Please] Mr. Postman” over electro beats. It’s like the old New York Scratch Masters—just a one-sided record with a seven- or eight-minute mix. This one has mostly upbeat stuff like “Take Your Chance,” “Planet Rock,” “Hard Times,” and “Mr. Postman,” which is actually over Jive Rhythm Traxx.

M.C. Mitchski “The Rappin’ Comedian” and M.B. “The Human Radio” “Brooklyn Blew Up the Bridge” (Ski Records Co.) 1987

This is, like, a five-track EP of what I used to hear on my tapes of The Red Alert Show. Of course, “Red Alert Is a Great Man,” they used to play that all the time. And “Brooklyn Blew Up the Bridge” was during the Queensbridge and the Bronx battle, trying to cash in on the KRS-One song. This is one of my favorite joints from that time. It’s a record that never came out here to the West Coast, but is definitely one of my top joints ever. I finally found it in Japan.

Divine Force “Holy War (Live)” b/w “Somethin Different” (Yamak-ka) 1987

I think this is on that Ego Trip comp that came out a while ago. It’s definitely one of those classic New York joints. I don’t even know what year—’87 probably. This is another one I used to hear all the time on my Red Alert tapes. Those were the tapes that made me want to get more hip-hop records. I was so stuck on West Coast [hip-hop] and faster beats that when I would hear this stuff, it was a new thing. “Holy War” is definitely one of those joints. I was hooked on it.

Jack Bruce Things We Like (Polydor) 1970

This is jazz-rock. It’s got some classic loops, like Showbiz and A.G.’s “Represent.” I had heard about the album and was like, “Oh word!?” It’s one of those albums that I had been looking for. Of course, I couldn’t find it in a record store by my house, but every once in a while, I would hit the college stations where I used to live and do a radio show. They would leave me alone after my set, and I would go through the records. I just happened to go on a college-station jacking spree, and they had it there.

James Brown In the Jungle Groove (Polydor) 1986

This is, like, my joint. Period. I can take this anywhere with me, and I’ll be all right. I can be DJing somewhere, and give me doubles of this, and I can go for hours. It’s definitely one of my joint albums. I could pick a million James Brown albums, because he’s got a lot of them, but this right here is the one I’ve got to have. It’s just a DJ record, and it’s got everything: double vinyl, loud pressing, “Funky Drummer,” “Give It Up or Turnit a Loose,” “Talkin’ Loud and Sayin’ Nothin’.” It’s one of the records I’ve got at least four copies of. Everywhere I see it—the reissue or the original—I buy them all.

Slum Village “I Don’t Know” (Sudden Impact) 1996

This was my first time really hearing Slum Village. I was hip—kind of—to it, because C-Minus had the Fantastic Vol. 1 joint on cassette, and then Rhett came back from Japan with this. It was so new, no one was really trippin’ on Jay Dee yet, so they were like, “Here’s twenty test pressings and a couple of copies of the real thing…try and get the word out.” Rhett sat on them for a good month before he even let anybody have it, because—and I hate to say it—I don’t even think he was trippin’ on it. It was just so different at that time. I remember bumping the tape, and Rhett heard that song and was like, “Man, I got that 12-inch.” I was like, “12-inch for what?” Sure enough, he came over the next day with doubles for me, and I was like, “Dude, you been sleeping on this the whole time!?” He was like, “I didn’t know.” And ever since then, we were killing that song. We were the only ones that had it out here too? We killed that song in L.A.

Atmosfear En Trance (MCA) 1981

This is a British soul group from the ’80s, and “Dancing in Outer Space” is this classic track that was played in all the house clubs and all that. It’s a more R&B/boogie/funk type of album, and not even “funk” funk, but ’80s funk. Peanut Butter Wolf and Madlib put me up on it, and this group right here opened up doors for me to try and find out more about the British funk scene. There’s still a lot I don’t know about it, so every once in a while when I go out there, I find a couple of discs here and there of some shit I’ve never heard of. There’s something from this one group, Funkapolitan, that I’m still trying to find, called “As Time Goes By.” It’s another one of those British jams that Wolf put me up on.

“Pretty” Tony “Get Some”

(Music Specialists) 1985

I got to have a little electro on my list. I could go all day with electro joints. This is just one of those Miami joints from ’85. It’s one record that stands out to me that didn’t sound like everything else that was coming out around that time. He was doing “Jam the Box,” and Freestyle, and stuff with Debbie Deb and Trinere. That was the highlight of his career right there, around ’85 and ’86, when he was coming out with hits left and right on the electro house party scene. When I finally found this, I was like, “Doubles!” This is a popular joint with me, and it’s one of those random hip-hop joints, because it’s not something that everyone’s yapping about.

Tim Maia Racional Vol. 1

(Seroma) 1974

This is from when I first went to Brazil. It’s the one that brings back the memories. There’s a track called “You Don’t Know What I Know,” and it’s only, like, thirty-four seconds, but it’s this a cappella song that’s just him singing about silly stuff. We would sing this song all day—me, B+, Madlib, Egon, Cut [Chemist], everybody. B+ already had it, because he had gone out there before and come up on, like, four boxes of records and made CDs of all the stuff he found. I think this came from an outdoor swap meet where they had volume one and volume two hanging up. I was like, “Tim Maia! I’m actually doing some damage now. I’m stepping my game up!”

It’s not just a Sergio Mendes album, because I had all that. We cleaned up out there. I know the prices aren’t the same because of us. We went out there and acted a fool. Records will do that to you.

Latin Rascals Big Apple Production Vol. II

(J&T Records) 1984

This is a representation of what I was listening to growing up. It’s just one big mix. I love edits, but sometimes it’s dope when it’s mixed, and, at the same time, this has all the hits from that day. Some of them I’m not too fond of, but this is actually one of the records the dudes on KACE would play. They would do their own crazy little mix, then throw in one of the songs that ended that mix, but it was really this record they were playing. I’d be thinking, “These guys are killing it tonight…they’re getting busy!” But it was definitely a record. I knew that probably, like, three years later when I finally got my own decks. This was a record that made me want to DJ. Whatever those guys were doing, I wanted to do. .

Mikey Dread was one of those unique artists that Jamaica produces every so often—his musical creations and nonconformist personality indicating a man cut from a different cloth. The individuality of his approach resulted in some of the most notable works to surface during the late 1970s and early 1980s, particularly where dub was concerned, and during those heady, short-lived days of the reggae-punk alliance, Dread was the reggae figure who most succeeded in stimulating interest in Jamaican music among a new set of overseas fans. Throughout his thirty-year career, Mikey’s intense live performances were also highly rated, and rightly so, as he always went that extra mile during fierce stage workouts that often lasted several hours, putting his band through the paces to make sure that every show was uniquely captivating. I can still remember the first time I heard African Anthem: The Mikey Dread Show Dubwise, whose nonstop mix of cartoon noises, haunted-house shrieks, and zany percussion made Joe Gibbs’s African Dub Chapter Three sound like an acoustic set from Peter, Paul & Mary. Better still were the dub B-sides of singles issued on his Dread at the Controls label, such as “Robbers Roost,” the electrifying flip of Edi Fitzroy’s wonderful “Country Man,” or “Internal Energy,” the delay-drenched dub of one of his earliest singles, “Love the Dread,” not to mention brilliant extended mixes of Junior Murvin’s “Bad Man Posse” or Mikey’s own “Roots and Culture,” with its killer dub, the horns-laden “Jungle Signal.” And he kept the music coming long after his heyday, with postmillennial recordings such as Rasta in Control and Life Is a Stage, which maintained high standards in an era of half-baked fakery. All of which made the news that Mikey had succumbed to a brain tumor that much sadder, though the odds were certainly not in his favor when the diagnosis first came last summer. He was born Michael Campbell in Port Antonio in 1954 on Jamaica’s northeast coast, where his mother came from. But as noted in the autobiographical “Dread Combination,” his father hailed from further west, so he spent formative years in Negril, returning to Port Antonio at the age of twelve. “Inna those days, people don’t have no one job unless you are Chinese or some business people,” Mikey said of his parents’ vocations. “Everybody else had to do multiple things to survive.”

Mikey’s enduring love of music began at a young age, and an early aptitude for electronics saw him running the radio station at Titchfield High School, then the only school in Jamaica awarded a broadcasting license. “Me live with me parents down in Negril for a while, and that’s how I really grew up,” he explained. “It’s from while I was in Negril that my interest kind of materialized for electronics, and make me become very aware about the power of electricity and communication. Then me just go back a Port Antonio without any friends, and me have to just go straight inna school, where me don’t know nobody. Me start play radio station at Titchfield High School, because we had a license, so we had, like, a fivemile radius for the radio station. Me run it, like when we’re in class—we just put on a LP, and we have a [record] changer, so when one LP done, it drop down, and the next one start play. And we used to jam the [other] radio [station frequencies], because the rich people carry their kids to school driving in the car, listening to RJR.1 So what me do, me just change our frequency to RJR, so if they come within five miles of the radio station, your radio just switch to me; when you ride into school and you hear some rub-a-dub inna the morning, you wonder what’s going on. Everybody knew me and this dude named Jeff; there was two of us in school that used to MC all the school functions and concerts, because we wanted to get into broadcasting, so we were the two people who always do them kind of thing there. The only difference with me now is, like, me always perform a tune as well, like a Big Youth tune, ‘S.90 Skank,’ or something else that current.”

After thus taking the microphone at school functions, Mikey also became involved with local sound systems Safari and Sound of Music. “Me a go school while me a play sound,” Mikey explained. “Me inna me teens when me a play sound, because after me go Port Antonio, overnight, I start to get my head together. I was a student always into the sciences and mathematics and physics, so you find because of what I wanted to do, I lead meself to that, and I go a library and read a whole heap of stuff, just out of curiosity. And me develop a certain love for broadcasting later on in life with the sound-system thing. My friend Howie work for the telephone company and him know electronics, so him always have some sound, and we play the sound anywhere—I don’t see back my house for weeks. They never want us to leave, just give me a house and food and everything, ’cause me a play some dangerous tune, like ‘Satisfaction’ by Carl Dawkins, and ‘Tell Her You Be Sorry’ by Freddie McKay.”

Campbell moved to Kingston during the mid-1970s to study electrical engineering at the University of the West Indies. “Me go to town when I-man go to a college, the College of Arts, Science, and Technology,” he explained. “Me live in Mona,2 because me have to board, so me have to find somewhere close to school—you are on a student loan, and you no have no transport, so you need to be near school. The farther you are from school, the cheaper it is, but the bus ride is questionable. My brother used to live in town, but he a live fi him life, and I live my college life.”

Soon Mikey began researching reggae history for a mandatory English essay and was introduced to influential music figures by his old friend from Port Antonio, singer Watty Burnett of the Congos. “That time when I am at school, I have to write certain research papers in English,” he details, “and I did mine on reggae. So I interview almost every man who existed at the time. Me interview every man ’pon Idler’s Rest3 and every artist. So, by that time, me start to know all the producers through Watty Burnett, who’s also from Port Antonio.”

Links forged on the music scene would later prove invaluable once Mikey began voicing material as a deejay.

First, however, came Mikey’s revolutionary input in Jamaican radio. “School children all over Jamaica are always fascinated by how they hear people on the radio, how they hear music play,” he continued. “So one of the main things every school does is carry you to the Gleaner Company to see how the newspaper is done, and take a tour of King’s House4 and the radio station. I see the man talk at the radio station, and I was fascinated by it, so me talk to them about the job. And then, years later, me come back to the same job, because I wanted to do electronics engineering [at college], but they never offer that, they only offer electrical and mechanical. And I had no interest in mechanical or electrical, but I still had to study it. Them never have nothing fi what me really want; them do three-phase power building, like how to install an elevator, something what me no really into, as I feel that is already a stagnant, dead industry, and I want to get into an industry that show development. To me, at that time, electronics show development, because I could compare the old-time radio, which is like the tube radio, till, inna my time, comes transistor radio—you can pick it up and walk with it, go a seaside, or inna the hills or whatever. And the tube [radio], you have to be plugged in, and you have to stay round them. Anyway, eventually I apply to RJR, RJR turn me down, saying I was too qualified, and me never understand that, like the man them no want to give me a chance. When you’re a young, smart Jamaican, they didn’t even want to give me a break. They just say, ‘Sorry,’ and turn me down. So me go a JBC5 and meet some people, a guy named Ossie Harvey, who was a popular technical operator. Because, back in the days, radio had two different sections, with a booth for the announcer, who faces the operator through glass. Radio in Jamaica was not like one man spinning the music, playing commercials, reading the news and the weather and talking. Radio was divided up into different departments, so me have a talk-back [button], whe’ me can talk to the announcer, and he can talk to me. I sit at the control, and I control him: if I turn his mic on audition and turn the board on audition and I’m playing strictly rub-a-dub on the next side, he don’t even know the difference.”

Mikey was thus hired as an apprentice at JBC in 1976, but was soon promoted to other duties. “I was supposed to be a trainee for a while, which was ironic,” he said, “because in Jamaica, within them time there, there was a lot of prejudism because of how black your skin is. So that force man like me, who is well Black, to really excel inna whatever I-man doing in terms of academics. Me can see a next youth, through his father [who] is Chinese—they will say he can get a job at the airport, but me must work inna one sugar factory. Me still have that vibes about me, and me no like how life treat certain people. My job was to go to JBC and learn, so me learn from some of the pros at the time, and it was supposed to be six months before I go into the field as a transmitter engineer, but, within six months, I realized that I can take this to a next level. Number one, on the town, I don’t have a lot of friends to hang out with on weekends, so my nights are free. Number two, JBC sign off at midnight, and I feel the kids from school were up studying until late night, so we wanted something to keep us company on campus: some man a play some U-Roy tapes, some man a play some Tippertone tapes, some man a play some Tubby’s tape. It’s like every man a listen to some rahtid thing, so when me leave, me done tell them man long time ’pon campus me going to go down and go change this, and me really humble myself and learn the ropes. And me tell Ossie Harvey and another man named Mr. Linton, why them never go twenty-four hours? Them say, ‘Boy, nobody listen to the radio after twelve o’clock.’ So, through me’s a country man, me tell them I would like to do a little thing a nighttime, and them say, ‘We’re going to give you this thing, because we like what you’re doing, but you would have to come a work on Saturday night too.’ I normally would have two days off, Saturday and Sunday, work Monday to Friday, but they said, ‘If you can dedicate every Saturday to this, then me give it to you.’ So me take it, but me had to give up a day off. Now and I only have Monday off, so now me just choose fi just work. And me and a girl named Freddy Rodriguez always do a little program; she used to be the announcer, and she was a nice, sexy announcer. So the JBC thing develop, and then Freddy Rodriguez, me and her would select from what the library had. And she would have other music she want to play, but when she left, I just bring in my record box and my dub plate. From I did my research from college, me already knew all of them man who saying anything in reggae. Me know where to locate every man, and me know what them a deal with.”

As Mikey was not allowed to speak on air, he mixed his show to be a seamless blend of back-to-back reggae, punctuated by bizarre jingles and over-the-top sound effects. At the time, Jamaican radio was heavily dominated by foreign pop music, so Mikey’s show caught on like wildfire and truly revolutionized its airwaves. Custom mixes provided by Lee Perry, King Tubby, and Joe Gibbs also boosted its popularity. Indeed, Mikey’s most important link was made with Tubby, the masterful recording engineer who encouraged him to begin voicing original material after noting Mikey’s talent on the mic and general intelligence. One of the earliest singles to feature his voice, the humorous “Barber Saloon,” was a local sensation due to Campbell’s clever lyrics and individual delivery, while a follow-up called “Love the Dread” was an equally popular single which led to his enduring stage name, although he did not actually wear dreadlocks until considerably later. Other early singles cut for Lee “Scratch” Perry, Sonia Pottinger, and Joe Gibbs helped establish his reputation on the Jamaican music scene.

“Me do a nice LP for Scratch,” Mikey insisted. “Scratch was one of my heroes too, because there was a song by Scratch I used to play on Radio Titchfield called ‘Blackboard Jungle,’ and ‘Cloak and Dagger Dub.’ That draw me to Scratch, but me never really meet Scratch until after me meet up with the Congos and start play a lot of Scratch music on my radio show. And Scratch make some exclusive dubs, some Bob Marley remix and some specials, like ‘Row Fisherman,’ most of the Congos tunes. And then me and Scratch start doing some recording together. After a while, me just start play a whole heap of Lee Perry everywhere, every time. And Scratch was always cool with me. Scratch is magical at what he does— Scratch would be standing, or he’d just be leaning up on a high stool, but Scratch is not an engineer that sit down on the left-hand side of the board, stretching towards the right-hand side. Scratch is all over the board, skanking and doing him likkle things with him echo and extra special effects. Whereas Tubby would have somebody else mixing, like Jammy. You could only get Tubby to mix on certain projects, if he feel like it. And Scratch get the best of Mikey Dread. Me make some tune with him when me really fresh, because every morning me leave JBC and reach home by six o’clock, and Lee Perry’s there, at my home. And him gone with me for the whole day until it’s time for me to go back and work the night. Him get a lot of good things, because him always have some great ideas. And me and him never had a problem, because the man is a genius, and I could recognize it, because I come from a different academic school.”

Mikey’s own recordings and such exclusives gleaned from Jamaica’s top producers gave the Dread at the Controls show a perpetual edge. But despite the immense popularity of the program with the Jamaican public, as well as it being a source of fascination for overseas listeners who obtained copies on audio cassette (including British DJ David Rodigan, who became Mikey’s pen pal), the program was eventually deemed too wild by the station management, leading to Dread’s resignation in 1979. “When I was on the radio, I was a VIP in big, bold capitals,” he emphasized, “because the people recognize that I am the man defending the culture of the country. And I move it to every house and every car and everywhere. Bob Marley a take the music to the people on tour, but at home, I was the one running things through the media, and the media take it to the world. If Jamaica was still fighting against the music, only a few reggae [acts] would escape outside of that. So me started from the foundation, and make sure when it lick that transmitter, that sound gone! To Cuba, Trinidad, and everywhere. When me travel and me meet people, they say, ‘Boy, we always a listen your radio.’ Me never know the radio a lick down a Trinidad and all over the Caribbean late night, because late night they have the best reception. Me and the other DJs on the rest of the stations at nighttime were the ones the people could listen to, so my job and my whole kinetic intervention in the whole reggae thing is to spread it globally, by the transmission of the energy, seen?”

By the time of his radio resignation, Mikey had already assembled the album Evolutionary Rockers (released in Jamaica in limited quantity), as well as Dread at the Controls, which was licensed to Trojan in the U.K. A second overseas disc called African Anthem, issued slightly later on a small independent called Cruise, was a dub album mixed to mirror the style of his radio broadcasts, which proved highly popular with punk audiences in Britain. Mikey also worked as a recording engineer at Treasure Isle Recording Studio before spending increasing periods in Britain, where he established branches of his Dread at the Controls label. He had also been approached by Chris Blackwell, who wanted Mikey to engineer at his soon-to-be-opened Compass Point Studios in the Bahamas, though Mikey ultimately declined that offer. A major turning point was reached in 1980 after Mikey was approached by the Clash, with whom he subsequently toured and recorded, which helped reggae reach a wider international audience. “We do some shows, but that was not an organized thing,” Mikey explained, “because for me to produce them, I wanted to hear or see what it was. In order for me to take a job, I need to know which sort of fans you have, and how does your music go across. I was impressed, but the crowds were spitting at each other. And me really feel sick when me see them still, for me no inna them thing there, but me see what the guys were doing, and we do the work, and it was good.”

Following his involvement in the group’s experimental album, Sandanista!, which was partly recorded at Channel One Studios in Kingston, Dread began spending extended periods in the U.K., where he attended the National School of Broadcasting, which led to his narration of Deep Roots Music, a sixpart reggae documentary aired on Channel 4 in 1982, as well as his subsequent hosting of the television series Rockers Roadshow, which featured live acts performing in various parts of Britain Meanwhile, in Jamaica, he had produced impressive and individual recordings by Edi Fitzroy, Earl 16, Rod Taylor, Junior Murvin, and relative unknowns such as Michael Israel, the Ovations, and Wally Bucker, as well as his own solo work, which was issued abroad by labels such as Stiff, Dub Vendor, and Rough Trade. Mikey was an early champion of the Roots Radics and was also instrumental in elevating the reputation of Scientist as dub engineer: the combination of these relationships gave his productions of the early 1980s a dramatic edge. His album SWALK, cut in London with U.K.-based